General Chat

Please give 2 suggestions giving a synopsis of each one. Vote to be friday 17th PM

Greaders suggestions for July August 2009
Promise Me by Harlan Coben
At 2.17 a.m. Myron Bolitar’s mobile phone rings. It is Aimee Biel, a frightened teenager who has called the one adult who had promised to help her if she ever got into trouble. Myron collects Aimee from a cold street corner but she persuades him not to take her home, but to drop her off at an unknown address in the suburbs. And, with a final wave from a darkened porch, Aimee disappears into the night……….

Driven by guilt and the desperation of her family, Myron is determined to find Aimee – whatever the cost. But he doesn’t realise just how far people will go to protect the ones they love.


The Other Hand by Chris Cleave

On the cover it says: We don’t want to tell you what happens in this book. It is a truly special story and we don’t want to spoil it.
Nevertheless, you need to know enough to buy it so we will just say this:
This is the story of two women. Their lives collide one fateful day, and one of them has to make a terrible choice.
Two years later they meet again – the story starts there…….

Once you have read it, you’ll want to tell your friends about it. When you do, please don’t tell them what happens either. The magic is how it unfolds.

n

Hi Ann,
Although I am not a greader I do keep an eye on it, to see what books are out there.
Hope you get some more replys tomorrow, I know you've mentioned before about dwindling numbers.
Anne

My suggestions for this time are

Old Boyfriends by Debbie Macomber

"She didn't understand how she could lie beside him in bed night after night and dream about another man..."When Susannah Nelson turned eighteen, her parents sent her to school abroad. She said goodbye to her boyfriend, Jake - and never saw him again. Years later, Susannah finds herself regretting the paths not taken. Returning to her parents' house and her girlhood friends, she also returns to the past - and discovers that things are not always as they once seemed...


The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

Forty years ago Harriet Vanger vanished. It’s time to find out why – whatever the cost

Will be back tomorrow with my suggestions.

Too sleepy at the moment to do it.

Tess

thanks, nudging for more.

My first suggestion is -

"Clan of the Cave Bear" by Jean M Auel

Amazon Review ...

The Clan of the Cave Bear is the start of Jean m Auel's epic "Earth's Children" series. (My comment .. but it stands well alone)

When her parents are killed by an Earth Quake, five year old Ayla wanders the forest completly alone. Cold, hungry and injured by a cave lion, the little girl is as good as gone until she is discovered by a group who call themselves the Clan of the Cave Bear.
This clan left homeless by the same quake, has little interest in the helpless girl, who came from the tribe they call "The Others". Only their medicine woman sees in Ayla a fellow human, worthy of care. She nurses Ayla back to health - a decision that will forever alter the physical and emotional structure of the clan.
Although the story takes place roughly thirtyfive thousand years ago, its cast of characters could easily slide into any modern tale.
The members of the Neanderthal clan, ruled by tradition and taboo, find them selves challenged by this outsider, (who represents the physically modern Cro-Maghons).
As Ayla begins to grow and mature, her natural tendencies emerge, putting her in the middle of a brutal and dangerous power struggle.


My second suggestion is -

Random Acts of Heroic Love by Danny Scheinmann

1992 Leo Deakin wakes up in a hospital some where in South America. His girlfriendd, Eleni is dead and leo doesn't know where he is or how she died. He blames himself for the tradgedy and is sucked into a spiral of despair.
But Leo is about to discover something that will change his life for ever.

1917 Moritz Daniecki is a fugitive from a Siberian POW Camp. Seven thousand kilometers over the Russian steppes separate him from his village and his sweetheart, whose memory kept him alive through carnage of captivity.
The Great War may be overr, but Moritz now faces a perilous journey across a continent riven by Civil War.
When Moritz finally limps back into his village to claim the hand of the woman he left behind, will she still be waiting?

This is a dramatic portrait of two men sustaining their lives through the memory of love.


Tess

Hide by Lisa Gardner

Near the grounds of an abandoned mental hospital, a buried chamber is discovered. Inside are six bodies, one of which may be that of a girl who has been missing for two decades--the best friend of a woman, Annabelle, who has spent her childhood moving from city to city, from identity to identity, hiding from someone or something totally unknown to her. She's been safe for several years now, but a single act of bravery plunges her right back into a life of fear.

Break No Bones by Kathy Reichs

While supervising a dig of Native American burial grounds in Charleston, S.C., Temperance Brennan finds more recent remains. Soon, her ex-husband, who's a lawyer, appears in town, pursuing leads in a missing persons case connected with a local church. Bodies start piling up at an alarming rate, and Brennan begins to suspect that the deaths are linked to each other—and her ex-husband's inquiry.

thank you, going well so far.

I would like to suggest two books by the same author, Nora Roberts:-

Firstly, Sea Swept.

After years of reckless independence and fast liv ing, Cameron Quinn is called home to help care for his adopted brother, Seth, a troubled young boy not unlike Cameron once was. Cameron's life changes overnight, as her has to learn to live with his brothers once again.
Old rivalries and new resentments flare between the Quinn boys as they try to set aside their differences for Seth's sake. Only Seth's fate is in the hands of a tough but beautiful social worker. She alone has the power to bring the Quinns together or tear them apart........


Secondly, Blood Brothers.

In the town of Hawkins Hollow, it is called The Seven.
Every seven years, on the seventh day of the seventh month, strange things happen. It began when three young boys accidently unleashed an ancient evil........

Caleb Hawkins can never forget what happened in the woods twenty-one years ago - and neither can Hawkins Hollow. For every seven years, there are a few weeks in July when the locals do unspeakable things - and then don't seem to remember them. The collective madness has made itself known beyond the town borders, and has given Hawkins Hollow the reputation of a village possessed...

It is this modern-day legend that draws repoter and author Quinn Black to Hawkins Hollow. She hopes to make the eerie happenings the subject of her next book. Caleb Hawkins, descendant of the town's founders, has agreed to talk to her. Itis only February, but Cal has already seen and felt the stirrings of evil. He will need help, from his best friends, Fox and Gage, and from Quinn. She has seen the signs as well and is somehow connected to the town and to Cal. Together they will form the corner stonnn of a group of men and women bound by fate, passion and the fight against what is to come out of the darkness...........

"When will there be good news?" by Kate Atkinson

I've read several books by Kate Atkinson but have only recently discovered she's a crime-writer too. I read this in one sitting.

In rural Devon, six-year-old Joanna Mason witnesses an appalling crime. Thirty years later the man convicted of the crime is released from prison. In Edinburgh, sixteen-year-old Reggie works as a nanny for a G.P. But Dr. Hunter has gone missing and Reggie seems to be the only person who is worried. Across town, Detective Chief Inspector Louise Monroe is also looking for a missing person, unaware that hurtling towards her is an old friend - Jackson Brodie - himself on a journey that becomes fatally interrupted.


"Happenstance" by Carol Shields

One book, two back-to-back stories about a weekend in the life of a married couple.
These two unique novels tell the stories of Jack and Brenda Bowman during a rare weekend apart in their many years of marriage. Jack is at home coping with domestic crises and two uncouth adolescents, while immobilized by self-doubt and questioning his worth as a historian. Brenda, travelling alone for the first time, is in a strange city grappling with an array of emotions and toying with the idea of an affair. Intimate and insightful yet never sentimental, Happenstance is a profound portrait of a marriage and the differences between the sexes that bring life — and a sense of isolation — into even the most loving of relationships.

Burn - by Linda Howard

When Jenner Redwine hit the lottery jackpot, her life took a turn for the worse. A cruise offers a chance to escape the freeloaders and fortune-hunters. But instead of soaking up the sun with friend Sydney, Jenner plunges into a cloak-and-dagger scheme to save her pal's life after the heiress is taken captive.
Everything depends on Jenner joining forces with the terrifying Cael Traylor, who's a good guy – sort of. And as her fear of Cael turns to fascination, she realises she's finally met a man worth living for – if she survives!


Just Breathe - by Susan Wiggs

Life and love are full of surprises for cartoonist Sarah Moon after she leaves her husband, only to find she is pregnant with twins.

wow, some good looking books here, it is going to be a difficult choice. are all the books fairly recent and readily available do you know?

Both mine,

Clan of the Cave Bear and

Random Acts of Heroic Love

are available from Amazon. I haven't checked other sites or the Library yet.

Tess

A new copy of Old boyfriends by Debbie Macomber is £3.49 and Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is £3.99, both on Amazon. (Or free at the library of course!)

Both of my suggestions are on Amazon.

A Family at War - 1970's television drama, the books are -
A Family at War by Kathleen Baker
To to turn of the tide by Johathan Powell
Towards Victory bvy Roy Russell

Follows a family from l938 to l945, excellent reading.

Another is "Paint it Black" - The Murder of Brian Jones by Geoffrey Giullano
For any Stones Fan.

I had to buy all these books from ebay, as our library did not have them.

Liz

Liz, which two are you suggesting please? We have two books to choose each if you are joining in with greaders and for each of the 2 books can you give a short synopsis please? thanks


If you are just giving us a list of good books to read that is fine but could you let us know please.
Ann

The first three form a series, set in Liverpool from l938 to l945. It concentrates on a family, and the effect the war has on them, especially as two of the three sons are killed.

The second is about Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, and the mystery surrounding his death.

Liz